


Stop/Go

by sylviarachel



Series: All the 221Bs [5]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Episode: s01e01 A Study in Pink, Episode: s01e03 The Great Game, Gen, Guns, John Has Trust Issues, Sherlock is careless with firearms, Suicidal Thoughts, johnlock if you squint, tw: suicidal ideation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-12
Updated: 2013-10-12
Packaged: 2017-12-29 04:01:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1000627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylviarachel/pseuds/sylviarachel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A pair of 221b ficlets connected only by the existence of John's gun. From wherever these things come from.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stop

“Trust issues,” Ella wrote on her notepad, and she’s not wrong about that. Who wouldn’t have trust issues after some of the shit he’s been through? Wouldn’t he be crazier to trust people?

What would it be like to have someone he could trust? If there were someone he could tell things to, would he tell them about the illegal handgun in his desk drawer? Tell them how he sometimes looks at it, holds it, imagines the cool kiss of the barrel against his temple, yearns for the oblivion that would follow?

If he told Ella any of this, if he went any further than the words he spoke this morning, _Nothing happens to me_ – the beginning of a sentence that ends _so I might as well be dead already_ – he’d be on a closed ward faster than he can say _sectioned!_ If you talk about it, he knows, it means you want someone to stop you.

John doesn’t talk about it.

When Mike Stamford calls out to him that afternoon, he has no idea he’s about to meet someone he could talk about it to.

And by the time he’s worked that out, Sherlock Holmes has happened to him, and he’s not that John Watson anymore.

He doesn’t think he ever will be again, until one cold afternoon outside Bart’s.


	2. Go

If John Watson ever shoots himself in the head, it won’t be by accident. He’s not sure the same can be said of Sherlock Holmes.

John owns a gun, and since meeting Sherlock he’s had many reasons to be thankful for that, starting with the night he shot the cabbie (because whatever Sherlock says, he can’t be _sure_ it was the right pill). Just now, though, with Sherlock babbling and violating _every fucking gun-safety rule ever_ and John collapsed against a wall, powerless to stop him, letting the mad brilliant idiot anywhere near a firearm (yes, John always locks it up, but lockboxes and password-protected laptops are equally at Sherlock’s mercy) seems like a very, _very_ bad idea.

But just moments later, when he’s kneeling with his hands on his head and Sherlock is pointing John’s gun at Moriarty, he’s changed his mind.

“… but everything I have to say has already crossed your mind,” Moriarty drawls.

Sherlock catches John’s eye, and everything they’re both thinking is in that glance: if they can take Moriarty with them, it will have been worth it. John nods minutely, and Sherlock’s glance darts away.

“Probably my answer has crossed yours,” he says.

John can feel Sherlock’s body vibrating. But his voice is steady, and at this range his trigger hand doesn’t even need to be.


End file.
